


Ocean Lives

by tresa_cho



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Aliens, Dramatic Rescue, Drowning, Escape, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Ocean, Peril, Sacrifice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-12
Updated: 2013-10-12
Packaged: 2017-12-29 06:04:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1001876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tresa_cho/pseuds/tresa_cho
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The last thing Leonard remembered was being shoved down a hill in the jungle. He woke up staked to the sand on an alien beach, and the tide is coming in.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ocean Lives

**Author's Note:**

  * For [holmes221b](https://archiveofourown.org/users/holmes221b/gifts).



> Written for a prompt given on tumblr!

As cliche as it was, sharp pain radiating from his ribs woke Leonard.

He groaned, and blinked open his eyes. It hurt to breathe deep- well, it hurt to breathe at all- but the blinding agony wasn’t sparked until he sucked in a full breath. Glancing down, he saw four ragged lacerations ripped into his side. He groaned and tipped his head back against whatever he was leaning against. A soft plonk joined the motion, and he twisted his head. A wooden stake. Really?

A pretty thick wooden stake, because the way his hands were lashed to it tugged relentlessly at his shoulders. He shifted, testing just how much give he had. Not much that didn’t send sparks of pain up and down his spine. It seemed more like a support than a stake.

Carefully he unfolded his legs and spread them. Nothing there seemed broken or injured, thankfully. That didn’t help his situation much. The communicator on his chest had taken damage in the initial scuffle, which had landed him here. He wouldn’t be getting a last-minute rescue. He was stuck for the time being.

Lifting his eyes, he set his gaze on the ocean cresting and frothing in front of him. The sand around him was packed flat from constant abuse, and when he twisted to look behind him, he saw it stretched quite a ways back. The tide most certainly reached this far inland, and much further back from the looks of it. He couldn’t hope that he’d be able to keep his head above the water once high tide reached.

“Well fuck.” He exhaled harshly, dragging the breath out between his teeth as his side flared. It was still bleeding, and he felt weak, slightly chilled. Blood loss. His head rolled along the post as he gulped down shallow breaths. “Any day would be nice, Jim.”

He’d lost sight of everyone in the ground team during the ambush. Jim had knocked him out of the way of a poison dart, and the force had sent him down a well-camouflaged hill. Something huge and masked in shadow had jumped him, and he didn’t remember much else. He felt certain he had woken in a village of some sort… Only to pass right back out…

He did not look forward to the salt water hitting those wounds.

Gritting his teeth, he wiggled his wrists in their bonds. He wasn’t going to sit around and wait to be rescued like some damsel. Jim might be looking for him, tearing the village apart. He couldn’t just wait. Waiting was for other people.

The only thing that prevented him from shredding his arms were his sleeves as he twisted and struggled to the point he blacked out again. He came to as water swept over his shoes with the incoming tide. Gasping, he tucked his legs up out of the water’s reach.

The ropes tying him to the post weren’t giving, and they were so thick that Leonard feared he would do more damage than good if he continued. He needed his hands. He needed the nerve endings in them, and the musculature, to remain intact.

The wet sand sucked at his boots, and he carefully dug the heels into the ground. He rolled his shoulders and strained upwards, gauging how much motion he had in the event this went to hell. Not much. He could barely move before the stretch in his side sucked the air from his lungs. Dropping back onto packed sand he panted, forcing black spots back from his vision.

Each wave brought the water inevitably closer, creeping up the sand like slow-moving death, and soon Leonard found himself sitting in shallow water. That horrible sucking sensation pervaded, and it felt like the sand was trying to eat him alive. Red rivulets formed in the water where his wounds bled into the ocean, and it wouldn’t be long before the first kiss of saltwater would scrape over raw skin.

He shuddered and clenched his jaw. The sun blasted down on him. The attack had shredded one of his shirt shoulders, and he could feel the sun searing into skin. Sunburn on top of drowning. Best day ever.

One more glance over his shoulder showed a few of the village gathered at the sand dunes on the horizon. They had come to watch. Slick dread curled around his gut. He was a sacrifice.

“Never going to a planet with an ocean again,” Leonard swore to himself. “Never going on a ground mission with Jim again. Never leaving MedBay again.”

He tugged fruitlessly at the ropes around his arms, just to have something to do. The waiting was the worst part. Apprehension. Of the pain he knew was coming as soon as water hit his side. Of the knowledge that cold, briny water would soon sweep over his face and choke him.

Breathing got harder, and Leonard forced his thoughts away from that train of thought. He closed his eyes and tried to remember good days at the beach. Shore leave with Jim. Building a sand castle with Jo-Jo. Loving Jocelyn under the stars…

Searing pain exploded in his side under the next wave, as water finally crested his open wound. The pain was so intense he lost consciousness again.

“Bones. Bones! Holy shit.” A hand slapped his cheek, a bit hard. “ _Please_. Open your eyes. Come on.”

Peeling his eyelids back took more effort than it should have. He peered blearily at a figure in front of him, crowding his vision and blocking out the sun.

“Jesus, Bones. Can you see me?”

Leonard narrowed his eyes, and his vision started to focus. Jim. It was Jim. He had to-

“ ‘m bleedin’ out, Jim,” Leonard said. His words slurred together as a full-body shiver rolled up and down his spine.

“I know, I know.” Jim cupped his face gently in both hands, pale. “I need you to hold your head up, Bones. Can you do that? Bones-”

Water slammed Leonard in the face, rocking him back against the post with bruising force and he choked on it. Jim’s hand closed over his nose and mouth, and Leonard jerked violently before his face cleared the surface again.

“I’ve got you. It’s okay. You can breathe- Bones-” Jim’s voice rose over Leonard coughing out water. “It’s okay.”

The dunk had roused him somewhat. He spat out salt water and shook hair out of his eyes. Jim helped push his bangs back. “Git me out of here, Jim,” Leonard said. Pleaded.

“I will,” Jim said fiercely. “But I need you to hold your head up. The water tightened the knots.”

Leonard managed to tilt his head back against the post. Water swirled around his shoulders, and he wondered exactly how long he had been out. He couldn’t feel anything in his extremities, whether from blood loss or plain old circulatory issues from the tight bindings, he didn’t know. He carefully didn’t ask Jim about the status of his hands. He didn’t really want to know.

Another wave forced him under, but this time he was able to keep his breath until it receded, though the water level was climbing. Leonard heard Jim swearing behind him.

“Knife?” Leonard gasped on an exhale.

“I can’t-” Jim swore again. “They tied the rope so intricately that to free you- I’d be too close to your arms, Bones.”

There’d be the chance of cutting him. Permanent damage. Losing his license.

“At least they have hobbies,” Leonard said before another wave smacked him in the face. He rode it out as best he could, but had to strain to keep his face clear when the water rolled back. “Jim-”

Jim was in front of him instantly, both hands cupping his head and holding him above the water. That’s when Leonard noticed the huge slash across Jim’s chest, splitting his communicator in two.

“Jim- Do it-” Leonard spat out water that swept into his mouth. He gasped pitifully. Another wave rolled over them, making Jim buoyant with its depth and force. Leonard gritted his teeth and held his breath for as long as he could, but when the wave quieted his nose and mouth were under the surface. And he couldn’t stretch any higher.

He panicked.

He shook Jim’s hands off as he thrashed, trying to clear his face from the water. Air exploded from him as brine climbed his nose, and he coughed explosively.

Before he could take a breath of water, Jim got him in a headlock and slammed a hand over his nose and mouth. Leonard couldn’t move, but he also couldn’t inhale. Suffocation haze settled over him and he went limp as another wave broke over them. Jim’s hand drifted briefly and Leonard watched the last of his air bubble to the surface.

Jim pinched his nose shut and hovered in front of him, blocking out sunlight filtering through the water. Jim sealed his lips over Leonard’s and exhaled.

Leonard greedily sucked in the borrowed air and the haze faded. Jim was still plastered against his front, reaching around him to get at the rope. Leonard closed his eyes and concentrated on staying calm, on utilising the brief respite to its fullest.

He finally felt some give in his shoulders, and with it the flood of hurt that came with moving. He snorted away precious air, and his diaphragm jerked in protest. Demanding him to breathe. To relieve the agony in his chest. To just get it over with-

He inhaled.

The shock of water in his throat forced his throat closed, and he gagged, entire body jerking desperately. The need to breathe over-rode the efforts to stop, and water slipped into his lungs.

He coughed explosively, body rebelling. The reaction just squeezed his chest tighter, and when he inhaled again, it was a full, deep breath of deadly water. It _burned_ in him, tore at his throat and nose and eyes. He choked out more air, getting nothing but water in return, and black crowded the edges of his vision. His lungs were going to burst. He wanted to pass out- Needed to- Fuck, it _hurt_ -

The last bubbles of air slipped out of his lips and he stared at them as they burst at the surface. The surface so close- He was drifting now, the pain fading as oxygen deprivation set in. He felt like he could hear his heart in his ears. Like it was in the ocean. Like he was the ocean. The light was growing above him, expanding until it filled his vision.

 

He woke again to searing pain in his chest. All over, this time, though. It hurt to breathe. It hurt to move. It hurt to fucking think.

He may have whined a bit, and shifted.

A hand came down over his, and he blinked, startled. Jim stood at his bedside, his lips pressed into a fine line. Leonard twisted his hand and laced their fingers. He had to close his eyes against the rush of relief threatening to kick his legs out from under him. “Thank you,” he said, his voice hoarse.

“Don’t thank me just yet,” Jim said quietly. He squeezed Leonard’s fingers. “The word’s not back on your arm yet.”

Leonard followed his gaze and saw that his other arm was a fresh dressing, not an inch of skin in sight until the wrappings stopped at his shoulder. He gritted his teeth and held Jim’s fingers tight. “It’s okay. I’m alive.”

“I’m sorry, Bones- I tried- And you were drowning-”

“Hey.” Leonard tugged lightly on Jim’s hand, demanding his attention. “Hey. Shut up. I’m alive, okay? A bit more important than my arm.”

“If I had been faster-”

“Jim,” Leonard cut him off. “This isn’t your fault. None of this. You saved me. You came for me. I could never be angry with you for that. Never, d’you hear me?”

Jim was quiet, wrapped in his imagined failures, and Leonard tugged on his hand again. “You might have been right about these beds.”

Jim glanced at him, confused. Leonard tugged harder.

“They’re more comfortable with two.”

The smile that spread over Jim’s face was brighter than the sun rising over the ocean. Jim climbed into the cot with him, mindful of the wires and sensors attached to Leonard’s body, and curled along Leonard’s side. Leonard tucked his face into Jim’s hair, breathing in the unique scent of Jim. “Thank you, Jim.”


End file.
